Reference
R3/2119
Title
Memorandum on roundsmen: by R. Salmon
Date free text
10 Dec 1816
Production date
From: 1816 To: 1816
Scope and Content
There will always be some old, ignorant, decrepit, lame or lazy men & inefficient boys.
Able, willing & industrious men: nearly 40 years ago they would shudder & lament at the idea of taking parochial relief.
However he doubts if a better way than going the rounds can be devised; better than relieving them without employment.
Admits that in some parishes 1/3 to ¼ only is paid by employer, and that some of the cost from rates falls on householders who employ no labour and so get no return.
Well knows that the price of the necessaries of life has been such that the wages of no labourer with a family was adequate to buy a sufficiency of trash sold for bread, (no doubt thousands of infants & old persons perished from it).
Labourers cannot be blamed for system, for continually changing masters & going the rounds cannot be liked by the worst.
Reference
Level of description
item